Wisley nine

Last week to Wisley, the first time, it seems for nine months. Clearly time to review our portfolio of heritage memberships.

We are still in the summer holidays, so there were plenty of Mums with young children. There was also a lot of sculpture planted around the gardens, which I found rather trying. Not very good, rather expensive and far too much of it. A reminder, if we needed one, of the fact that Wisley have climbed onto the treadmill of everlasting expansion. From which I associated to a story about how farmers can fall prey to a similar disease, pouring ever increasing amounts of chemicals into their operations, a pouring which requires them to sell more and more stuff - to supermarkets which drive a hard bargain and who can dump one on the toss of an inebriated buyer's coin.

Main building

A snap of the old building, not so very different from that at Standen, albeit built for a gardening charity rather than a railway solicitor. Lots of new sheds going up, more tasteful than those a supermarket might put up, but no signs of solar panels which I thought odd. I would have thought a garden place would have been into saving the planet. That said, the new roof tiles did look a bit odd, so maybe something is going on.

The good news was that despite the recent hear, their flowers were in fine form.

Cosmos

Quite near to the main entrance we came across a handsome new covered walkway (I feel sure that there is a word for such a thing but cannot put my tongue on it), made out of what like substantial and expensive curved steel sections, parts of some of which can be seen in the snap above. Not laburnums but the same sort of idea as the laburnum arch at Hampton Court. And the flowers at the bottom were rather handsome too, known to BH but not to me as Cosmos. Now forgotten again, but Google image search, in the odd second or so, tells me that it is indeed Cosmos, more particularly 'Cosmos bipinnatus, commonly called the garden cosmos or Mexican aster'.

Dahlias

Part of the very flashy display of dahlias.

Grass

One suspects that it takes more than TLC to have their grass looking like this. Our back lawn went completely pale brown, and while there are now some green shoots of recovery (to coin a phrase), it is still nothing like this.

Dry country plants

Big hot house in fine form and I always enjoy the dry country section, although sorry on this occasion to miss the big aloes, which seem to have gone missing. Sub tropical outdoor garden in fine form. In fact, lots of good stuff everywhere, sculpture permitting.

Lunch in the main canteen, where we were entertained rather than annoyed by the large numbers of well behaved children. I had a half chicken, about the same price, but not as good as the demi poussin offered by Café Rouge on the occasion noticed at reference 3. Not cooked enough for my taste. On the other hand the potatoes were fine and I was pleased to get a portion of green kale - a genuine, boiled green vegetable. An endangered species, despite the wave of casual eateries, graduates and celebrities of food. BH was happy with her fish.

Lily pond

The big lily pond, snapped on our way out, having passed on this occasion on the second hand books (from their continuing clear-out of their fine library) but not on the shop proper.

Reference 1: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2017/11/returns.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2018/08/standen.html.

Reference 3: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2018/08/puligny-montrachet-off.html.